Kenji Tanaka, Senior General Manager of Sony's Digital Imaging Business Group, pictured in Yokohama for the 2018 CP+ show.

At the recent CP+ show in Yokohama, we sat down with executives from several major camera and lens manufacturers. Among them was Kenji Tanaka, of Sony. In our interview we discussed the new a7 III, as well as Sony's plans to attract more professional users, without ignoring entry-level and APS-C customers.

The following interview has been edited slightly for clarity and flow.

What is your target customer for the new Alpha a7 III?

We describe it as a basic model but maybe our definition is different [to other manufacturers]. What we mean is that any customer can use this model. Many professionals could use the a7 III, I think. I hope that many kinds of customer will be happy with this model, so we’re not strictly defining a target customer for the a7R III.

The new Sony Alpha a7 III is ostensibly an entry-level model in Sony's a7-series lineup but despite its relative affordability, it's packed with features.

Sony had a very busy year last year – what are your priorities going into 2018 and beyond?

We’re displaying the 400mm F2.8 [at CP+] – of course many articles are written about the a7 III, but as well as the camera bodies, the lenses are very important. Especially lenses like the 400mmm F2.8 – sports photographers are a new category for us.

One of the most important lenses for sports photographers is the 400mm F2.8

Last year we launched the a9 and some sports photographers are already using the a9, for example at the Olympics, but one of the most important lenses for sports photographers is the 400mm F2.8. The weight is very light. Usually sports photographers use monopods because the lenses are very heavy, but the weight of our 400mm F2.8 is very light, and you can use it handheld, which makes it easy to create different kinds of photographs. We already announced the development of this lens, and the launch is scheduled for this summer.

How important is feedback from sports photographers?

It’s very important. Not only when it comes to quality, but also durability. The winter Olympics for example, with the low temperatures, whether a product works in those tough conditions is very important. Whether or not we will launch a new product, the proof of concept is very important.

For a product aimed at a hobbyist, maybe it's less important but for the 400mm F2.8 we’re really dedicated to create a ‘monster’ lens.

Sony was showing a prototype of its forthcoming 400mm F2.8 at CP+, which Mr. Tanaka sees as an essential weapon in Sony's arsenal of lenses if the company is going to attract professional sports photographers to the brand.

There have been questions about the weather sealing of a7-series and a9 cameras. Is this something you want to address?

In really bad conditions, in really heavy rain, will photographers keep on taking pictures [for long periods of time?] I don’t think so. In those conditions, most photographers will use some kind of rain cover. But of course durability is very important. Photographers should be able to shoot [in poor weather]. We have an internal ‘weather test’ and for each kind of customer we will aim to produce products with adequate durability.

For a professional camera, the requirement for durability is higher

Is that something that your professional users are asking for?

Yes. But we need a balance between durability, and size and weight. For a professional camera, the requirement for durability is higher, but for hobbyist kinds of camera, the priority is smaller size and lower weight.

Tamron and Sigma are now creating lenses for Sony FE - is this a good thing for Sony?

Yes, it’s a good thing. The E-mount is an open standard – anyone can create a lens for the E-mount system. Of course there are criteria for compatibility, but because we think that the E-mount is a good technology, we think that the open format is good for the market and good for customers.

Tamron's first lens for full-frame Sony mirrorless cameras will be the upcoming 28-75mm F2.8 zoom. Sigma is planning its own range of native E-Mount primes and zooms, too.

How long will it be before Canon and Nikon join Sony and mirrorless full-frame becomes the norm?

This is just my personal opinion, but I think that maybe by next year’s CP+ you’ll see full-frame mirrorless cameras from Canon and Nikon. I think [by then] they will be participating in this market.

If cameras are going to develop, manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies

Just look at our technologies, like eye focus. All of those are made possible because of data from image sensors. In DSLRs, the data comes from separate sensors. The main imaging sensor is blacked out, 90% of the time by the mirror. The sensor is turned off. But the imaging sensor is very important. So if cameras are going to develop, and be able to capture the moment [more effectively], manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies. So within one year, I think.

Do you think we’ll see mostly mirrorless cameras at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo?

Yes.

How many of those cameras do you want to be made by Sony?

Many! But the professional market is very conservative, so we’re taking it step by step. We saw some photographers using the Alpha 9 at this year’s winter Olympics but of course the majority was Canon and Nikon. But the number of Sony photographers is increasing.

The Sony Alpha a9's innovative wide-coverage autofocus system makes it a powerful tool in the hands of an experienced sports photographer.

A lot of our readers want more Sony APS-C lenses…

We know that some people think we’ve neglected the APS-C market, but it’s just an issue of prioritization. A couple of years ago we introduced the a6500. Then the next year we introduced the a9, and the a7R III. But we think that the APS-C market, and APS-C customers are both very important, because the majority of the market is APS-C, and we’re developing many kinds of APS-C products, so please be patient – we will never ignore APS-C.

Some of your competitors keep flagship products up to date over time with firmware updates. This seems like the opposite strategy to Sony. Is this something that might change?

We’re still in the early stages of challenging the market with our products, and the new model cycle is relatively rapid, compared to our competitors. But the next step is to increase our market share. And if we want to reach new customers, we need [to make] new types of cameras.

We’re still in the early stages of challenging the market with our products, and the new model cycle is relatively rapid

Sony makes a lot of key devices, for example image sensors and processors. I’m originally an engineer. Engineers always want to provide the latest sensor, the latest processor, and so on. Maybe this is one of the reasons our product release cycle is faster than some of our competitors. [But] user-upgradable software is very important. Our new model cycle is speedy, however I think that firmware updates are something we should offer.

Editor's note:

Our conversation with Mr. Tanaka was candid and interesting, coming in the middle of a very busy period for Sony. The company has released a lot of high-end products over the past 18 months, and shows no signs of slowing down. We don't know how far out the new 400mm F2.8 sports lens is, but given recent sightings of at least one working prototype 'in the wild' at the winter Olympics, it could be pretty imminent.

Mr. Tanaka knows that Sony won't have the full-frame mirrorless field to itself for much longer, and welcomes the competition

Mostly I came away from this interview with the strong sense that Sony isn't planning on resting on its laurels. Mr. Tanaka knows that his company won't have the full-frame mirrorless field to itself for much longer, and welcomes the inevitable competition from established DSLR manufacturers like Canon and Nikon, as well as third-party lens manufacturers like Sigma and Tamron. As he correctly points out, some of the most useful features to emerge in the photography market in recent years could only have been possible thanks to mirrorless technologies, and Sony deserves enormous credit for developing and perfecting many of these technologies faster than any other manufacturer.

Sony will not ignore either APS-C users, or entry-level full-frame customers

It was very reassuring to hear Mr. Tanaka stress the importance of durability, as well as technology in Sony's high-end cameras. Concerns have been raised about the ability of some of its products to withstand use in wet conditions, but clearly this is something that the company is mindful of – especially in cameras and lenses designed for professional use.

That's not to say that Sony is focused entirely on breaking into the professional market. Mr. Tanaka was at pains to reassure us that Sony will not ignore either APS-C users, or entry-level full-frame customers. The new a7 III is proof of the latter point – a 'basic' model in Sony's terminology, but one that I suspect will satisfy the needs of many enthusiasts and even professionals.

A camera with an electronic viewfinder where the sensor is activated all the time will always consume vastly more energy than a camera with an optical viewfinder. Neither the option to carry a bag full of batteries nor power banks can change the reality that for any given mAh available, you are going to get significantly more shots from the same mAh with a camera with an optical viewfinder.

And how does mirrorless do in cold weather? Many places in the world there can be not only -10, but -20, -30 and some places even -40 degrees C.

We need to consider that:

- The electronic viewfinder is sensitive to cold and will shut down when an optical viewfinder functions flawlessly in any temperature

- A mirrorless camera gives a far lower number of shots per charge in any temperature as compared to an OVF-equipped DSLR

If the Sony executive was truthful he would have said, we cannot properly weather seal our bodies because our cameras have problems with overheating, and by not properly weather sealing our bodies this allows the heat to dissipate.

Sony Cameras do overheat. THAT IS A FACT. Professionals need a camera that can shoot in all weather conditions. Landscape photographers take their cameras to the coast. A wave suddenly crashes and soaks the camera. If it is a Sony, kiss your investment GOODBYE. Lens rental took apart such a camera and found it destroyed. https://www.lensrentals.com/blog/2017/10/about-getting-your-camera-wet-teardown-of-a-salty-sony-a7sii/ But if camera geeks get excited at the specs of Sony Camera and think they accomplish this by not cutting corners, go right ahead and buy that Sony. It is your money.

Canon in their interview took a shot at Sony. Quote It’s also about post-purchase support. Durability, reliability, and the ability to withstand extreme temperatures. Our users are able to enjoy this level of performance and they appreciate that.EndquoteEVERYBODY, except the Sony fanboys, know that he is talking about Sony.

I always find it to be amusing when a writer says that a company “welcomes” competition, particularly in an area they had to themselves. Despite what a company official may say, we really need to read between the lines.

The reality is that they are gritting their teeth at the thought of competition in what they’ve considered to be their space, and are forcing a smile on their faces when they say that competition is welcomed. They know that if Canon and Nikon intro higher end full frame mirrorless, that unless these cameras are dogs, which is unlikely, their universe of sales for their own product has significantly shrunken. There is no way they welcome that. But they can’t say it.

Except that what you’re saying isn’t even close to being true. And Sony has made no headway in the camera market, despite spending all that money. It’s interesting to note, that Canon, which was criticized for taking too long about entering the mirrorless market, is now the sales leader in that category.

Sorry, but you should look at the numbers in the corporate reports, and those supplied by the Japan camera industry. Sony is still an also ran, trying out numerous bodies and lens mounts in the hope that one or more will have some success. So far, none have done all that well.

The main reason why Sony was in a hurry to go mirrorless was because that Canikon duo has 91% of the DSLR market, with Canon owning about 50%. Sony has about 5%, the same they had right after buying Minolta.

But Canon rocketed up as soon as their mirrorless line came out.

Don’t believe me? Fine, but get the numbers for yourself, and you’ll see.

If I were Sony, I would dump APS-C altogether and offer a very cheap "true entry level", full frame camera. IMO, It's not "entry level" if it means you'll be replacing it all later as in the case of APS-C being intended as "entry level." Start them on FF and keep them there with their lenses. Give entry level a chance to buy lenses for a cheap body. Why not?

I agree, look at the A73, how feature rich it is and yet only $500 dollars more than a6500 and yet a much better camera. They should release and A5 series, say 6fps, lesser AF, few other key features missing, but price it at $1499. No one would miss the a6xxxx. Alos let's face it, it's likely a6700 will be $1699 knowing Sony's pricing strategy and why on earth would you buy that over the A73, which also has better ergonomics. a6xxx are worst camera on the market for having poor ergonomics

FF sensors are still expensive. There is still a signifiant price differential between APS-C and FF sensors. As long as that price differential exists (and it always will), there will be a place for APS-C.

Bigger sensor size results in far lower yield. That's a reality that is not going away. And this reality results in a cost differential. Even small cost differentials are significant to camera manufactures.

Gosh, start people on a gently tinkered A7 (they were selling between £700-1000 in the recent past), call it the A7neo or whatever. Still the question of size though - Not everybody wants a A7 + glass sized kit in absolute terms, never mind that it's comparatively smaller than FF DSLRs.

@thx1138 - "I agree, look at the A73, how feature rich it is and yet only $500 dollars more than a6500 and yet a much better camera."

A6500 is $1398 ($600 less expensive than the A7III), and it's Sony's *most expensive* APS-C body. Sony also has the A6000 for $548 and A6300 for $898. So the price differential between APS-C and FF is *not* just $500! And people *would* miss the A6XXX APS-C series. You know what's going to happen if Sony stops selling APS-C, and only offers FF? A lot of customers will go elsewhere to buy APS-C mirrorless. They'll go to Fuji, Canon, or (eventually) Nikon for APS-C. They aren't going to say, "Hmm, I'll just spend several hundred dollars more and buy FF!" Outside of the dpreview bubble, most consumers are quite price conscious. A difference of hundreds of dollars between cameras is a big deal, especially at the consumer level. You need cameras that cover a wide range of price points. Having both APS-C and FF allows Sony to do that (and still make money).

Since the majority of the market is aps-c, there is no way any company can drop it.

Like it or not, smaller cameras and lenses will always cost less, weigh less, and be physically smaller. Most people like that, and so those cameras sell well. If Sony dropped them, their sales would also drop by 2/3s. No way it’s going to happen.

To your point, just look at how Canon is entering the mirrorless game--from the broadest, entry price point base. All tides rise and both Canon and Nikon will rise to stand on Sony's pier. What will ultimately separate them will be a sensor performance so marginal that all but the most sophisticated of pixel peepers will ever see discern the difference. Canon glass, Nikon Glass still has gas.

@jhaakas "Absolutely agree! APSC was ok when sensors were expensive. Today if larger sensors can be produced, why not start with FF!"

Because it is total overkill for most people. The irony is improving sensor technology has made aps-c so good I question the need for anyone to go FF unless they need the high resolution offered of 38/42mp.

Wildlife photographers like cropped sensors with many pros using aps-c and going FF would preclude many amateurs from acquiring lenses long enough to enjoy that aspect (and sports photography) of the hobby.

Add in the fact that once you leave short focal length primes behind lenses get big and heavy in FF I don't think the case stacks up for a 24mp FF camera when there are cameras like Nikon D7xxx, D500, the Fuji's etc out there. M43 is also plenty good enough for many and offers much smaller kit.

It's not all about sensor size but kit size and weight and cost of lenses. The obsession with FF from amateurs seems a bit perverse to me.

There is a good reason why both Canon and Nikon have relatively low resolution in their top of the line Pro models.

Unless you’re shooting landscape, and need huge prints, there is very little Pro photography that requires very high resolution. I know that a lot of people are still stuck in the megapixel game. But once we get to 24mp, or so, fewer people need that increase. Not that many people won’t want it. But real working pros know better.

I ran a large commercial photo lab in NYC for some years, and so I’ve got experience in that. Publishing doesn’t have need of high resolution. Most magazines are 150 lines. 300 dpi for a full two page spread is met by 20mp without any problems. Pros don’t crop much.

He is having the problem of Canon and Nikon glass prevents users to switch to mirrorless. So if Canon and Nikon decide to go mirrorless, their users will have to select camera and glass for a new mount, that will open up to Sony a large portion of the camera market (DSLR) that is currently locked by Canon and Nikon. For Canon and Nikon, going mirrorless is very risky because they don't have the experience of Sony. For Sony, Canon and Nikon entering the full frame mirroless business is a huge opportunity because Sony already have the tech, Sony can start a price war against new entrants who may fail.

Canon and Nikon can't create serious mirrorless body that can compete with sony, without having to cannibalize / directly compete with their own DSLR cameras. If they start making mirrorless bodies with much more features than their DSLR cameras, their DSLR customers will become unhappy. Only range Canikon can safely compete in is the entry level mirrorless, where it doesn't matter as much if there isn't many features, regular consumer at that price point probably doesn't care too much.

Caniokon need to focus on new buyers.. they also could be the ones that own dslrs. Someone needs to come up with adapters that can drive the motors in lenses. It should not be difficult as we only need an electronic interface.

If you read the interview with Canon also just published on this site, you would see that they haven’t decided to have a new line of lenses for full frame mirrorless.

While Nikon has a problem here, Canon has much less of one. The Nikon body depth is the same it was in the 1950’s, when the mirror was primitive, and normal lenses were 58mm long. Canon’s body is significantly shallower. This allows Canon to make a full frame model that still fairly thin, and allows all of Canon’s Lenses to work. That would be a major advantage for them that no one else would have.

For smaller sensors, people want smaller, lighter bodies and lenses. But for full frame, that isn’t as much of a problem. Just eliminating the prism and mirror mechanisms would give a significant weight loss, as an electronic replacement won’t weigh nearly as much.

Of course, if Canon could manage to make a new body that was thin enough to have an adapter for the EOS line that allowed all features to work, that would be ok.

I couldn’t fit it in, but Nikon could do that last as well. Giving up the vast lens lines they both have would be a disaster if they had a body that, even with an adapter, couldn’t focus to infinity, or otherwise lost some features.

Sony has been struggling over the years to come up with a full line of amateur and professional lenses, and they still have a long way to go. I can’t see Canon or Nikon wanting to start from scratch.

"We describe it as a basic model but maybe our definition is different [to other manufacturers]. What we mean is that any customer can use this model." Low blow to Canikon ;)

"But we think that the APS-C market, and APS-C customers are both very important, because the majority of the market is APS-C, and we’re developing many kinds of APS-C products, so please be patient – we will never ignore APS-C." Replace APS-C with A-mount, and it sounds like this has already been said more than once.

Though I love what Sony is doing with the A7III, coming from the A6000, I wish they could give the 3 or 4 lenses the APS-C line-up is seriously lacking (f2.8 zooms and at least one very fast prime). A6500 is a great body, but without lenses, if I were to shoot APS-C, I'd go to Fuji immediately.

@osv: What high-end quality zooms ? The 18-135 ? The 16-70 which is horribly decentered most of the time ? Come on, I bet you don't shoot Sony APS-C, because if you were, you wouldn't write this. Fortunately, there's Sigma to add some proper lenses to the system, but who would buy a A6500 to pair it with a "high-end" 18-135 ? This is entry-level lens (despite its price).

16-35 and 24-105 are not APS-C zooms. You talk about high-end APS-C zooms. Save the 18-135, Sony hasn't released any APS-C lenses since... the 16-70f4, which is far from being "high-end" in quality. And this was long ago. So what APS-C lenses, please ?

"If cameras are going to develop, manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologiesJust look at our technologies, like eye focus. All of those are made possible because of data from image sensors. In DSLRs, the data comes from separate sensors. The main imaging sensor is blacked out, 90% of the time by the mirror. The sensor is turned off. But the imaging sensor is very important. So if cameras are going to develop, and be able to capture the moment [more effectively], manufacturers have to develop mirrorless technologies. So within one year, I think."

Don't get it wrong. It is purely about business. He is having the problem of Canon and Nikon glass prevents users to switch to mirrorless. So if Canon and Nikon decide to go mirrorless, their users will have to select camera and glass for a new mount, that will open up to Sony a large portion of the camera market (DSLR) that is currently locked by Canon and Nikon. For Canon and Nikon, going mirrorless is very risky because they don't have the experience of Sony. For Sony, Canon and Nikon entering the full frame mirroless business is a huge opportunity because Sony already have the tech, Sony can start a price war against new entrants who may fail.

From purely tech perspective, it makes sense to get rid of the mirror and use the same sensor for AF and exposure. However, it will always be pulled back due to the baggage of lenses that exist. They can sure keep using the dslr, however newcomers now have a choice!

Sony lost in dSLR wars so the retreated in the mirrorless where they know that Canon and Nikon will not involve soon. Now they are inviting Canon and Nikon to start a mirrorless war thinking they are strong enough at least not to lose it as they did with dSLR wars.Sony is an excellent sensor manufacturer. Their mirrorless cameras are decent. So they may succeed in expanding the mirrorless market and keep a decent market share as Canon and Nikon have to develop new lens lines.

I actually think this was all part of Sony's longterm plan. First, they became experts at producing camera sensors, producing them for other brands. Then they bought Minolta's DSLR business to learn about making ILC's and lens manufacturing. Then they started developing SLT technology to hone on-sensor AF and EVF systems. They took all of these lessons and put it into their mirrorless system, knowing full well that it would be impossible to go up against Canon/Nikon in the DSLR business (having learned that lesson from Minolta). Sony has been playing the long game for a long time. I don't think any of these moves were an accident. Sony wasn't simply stumbling through all of this haphazardly. All of these things have been a calculated long-term investment and R&D process for Sony. Everything has been building up to this point, from the time they started making sensors, to the time they bought Minolta's camera business, to their partnership with Zeiss for lens expertise, to now.

@baloo-buc... they aren't inviting a mirrorless war, they are simply stating the obvious and the inevitable. Anyone can see that Nikon and Canon have no choice but to enter the full frame mirrorless segment and everyone knows that they are already planning to do so.

@Clayton: Mirrorless have some design flaws as well as some advantages. The design flaws can just be reduced unless they change totally the design. Mirrorless supporters pretend that the mirrorless is a totally new technology. It is the same old technology of P&S cameras that appeared with the first digital cameras. They just transformed a fixed lens system to a system that allows changing of lenses. Their main advantage is that they are much cheaper to manufacture.

@T3: It may be the long term plan but they let down a lot of people on the road. Sony is an electronic company. They were quite inexperienced in precision mechanics so even with Minolta department they decided to reduce the mechanical part with SLT. They launched NEX line the APS-C line then abandoned them in favor of full frame mirrorless because the market share doesn't provide enough revenues.From the company point of view these were excellent decisions. From the customer point of view they were not optimal for them (fortunately the small market share and the short time span of the system reduced the number of customers that suffered).

@baloo_buc.... those are weak arguments. The cloud, AI, wireless, face recognition, and just about anything else you can think of would be considered old technologies if you want to be literal about it. It is how you use and advance technology that is key. And while you are right that cost to manufacture is likely a key advantage it isn't the only advantage and may not even be considered the main advantage. Sony and I'm sure others are just scratching the surface of what they will be able to do with future iterations and it will be much more difficult if not impossible to do the same with DSLRs unless you combine the two which is a possibility but likely too costly to work.

@baloo_buc - You're misinformed. Sony didn't abandon NEX. They simply dropped the NEX name. Sony APS-C mirrorless is still going strong. APS-C is an essential part of any APS-C/FF system. Not everyone wants or can afford FF. Sony's APS-C bodies are still hot sellers. APS-C and FF gives Sony a very good mix, and both are selling well. Just look at the sales rankings on Amazon:

So much for your claim that Sony abandoned APS-C mirrorless! Furthermore, Sony's Kenji Tanaka said in the article above, "But we think that the APS-C market, and APS-C customers are both very important, because the majority of the market is APS-C, and we’re developing many kinds of APS-C products, so please be patient – we will never ignore APS-C."

Apparently baloo_buc doesn't know how to read or is just making stuff up.

A6700 with BSI which is a APS-C version of A7 III will eventually appearbut won't be in the near futuremy guess is at least 3 years from A6500 reLease (still 2 more years)reason is as aboveno real threat (both Fuji and EF-M not a threat, MFT maybe)

as to lens, as always my advice to anyoneif current Sony APS-C lens lineup not enough, don't get into the system

don't dream of whatever new lensif u get it like recent sigma 16mm, it is like winning a lottery, don't expect it

What he's basically saying is that DSLRs are hitting their limit when it comes to further development. Take a look at focus point coverage, especially on FF cameras, for example. FF DSLRs are still limited to having focus points in the central region of the the viewfinder. It's a limitation of having a separate DPAF focus module that sits below the main mirror that is fed by a sub-mirror system. Meanwhile with FF mirrorless cameras, they already have focus point coverage across the entire image frame.

@T3I say that there is no difference between a mirror and a mirror-less, or couldn't care less as long as the pics are the same. The problem is this: optical viewfinders are superior (not even close) and there goes the excitement for a new gadget that serves the purpose of being good only to the people selling it

@oldfashioned - I'm a DSLR user who now uses mirrorless. I can't go back to OVF. OVFs seem so primitive to me now. Limited focus point coverage, no face/eye AF, no focus box around people's faces, no real-time exposure preview, no in-viewfinder histogram for ETTR, no focus peaking or focus magnification, no in-viewfinder image review, no instant grid pattern overlays (http://cdn.audiencemedia.com/var/photoreview/storage/images/media/images/grid-patterns/2370420-1-eng-GB/grid-patterns.jpg) etc. I also like setting my EVF to black-and-white mode because I find it very helpful for composition (it allows me to see the scene more abstractly). I *love* that b/w viewfinder capability! That's one feature that *really* helps me to be a better photographer (and the previous features I mentioned also help as well). Can't do that with an OVF! So for me, EVF is far superior in the tools and capabilities that it offers me over OVF. It's not even close :)

@T3 is correct that dSLR are hitting their limits in terms of development, but it’s only really the latest “third gen” cameras which are performing in the real world as well as the D750 and D850. Things like focus point spread are impressive on paper on the Sony, but in the real world the difference is minimal. It’s about technology for its own sake vs technology which actually makes a different.

This isn’t to dismiss the A9 / A7RIII / A7III; but the specs don’t tell the whole.

@Eloise.... everyone has formed this habit of defining performance from the perspective of a DSLR instead of the other way around. How do DSLRs perform from the perspective of a Sony mirrorless camera? The answer is that the difference isn't minimal when viewed that way. Most people that have used mirrorless cameras seriously for a long time get this but most DSLR users that either haven't used mirrorless or they just dabble in it don't seem to get it. There were many things that mirrorless cameras did better well before the AF, battery life, speed and EVF performance was there. Now as you said the differences in these areas are minimal but the other advantages are still there. DSLRs are running out of advantages because of the technical limitations and that gap will continue to grow which is why Nikon and Canon have to get on board soon and they will.

@Eloise - "Things like focus point spread are impressive on paper on the Sony, but in the real world the difference is minimal. It’s about technology for its own sake vs technology which actually makes a different."

Haha, what you said reminds me of what people said in 1998 when Canon introduced their new 45-point AF system in the EOS 3. Prior to the EOS 3, the best SLRs only had about 5 AF points and smaller coverage (such as on Canon's flagship EOS 1N and Nikon's flagship F5). People said, "Things like focus point spread are impressive on paper, but in the real world the difference is minimal. I don't need 45 AF points, I just need one good AF point! 5 focus points is plenty!"

This is a typical argumentative style that has been going on for decades in cameras: "If my camera system doesn't have a particular feature that some other camera system has then that feature is pointless, a gimmick, of no value, makes minimal difference, just technology for its own sake, etc, etc."

Not nearly as effective as having a camera that locks onto a face and is able to hold onto that lock without you dragging your finger around a touchscreen. Face/eye AF allows you to concentrate more on composition, rather than having to concentrate on dragging your finger around trying to keep up with someone's face.

mandatory requirements for agencies and the 40,000 pro sports professionals (in the order)1. 400 2.8 lens on FF or 300 2.8 on 1.32. weather sealing3. pro supportthe points 1,2 and 3 are connected: any of those missing and there will be no chances to participate. None.mirror or less makes no difference (none)

Yes it's an impressive camera but I don't think Sony's strategy is correct. The problem for Sony is that this market segment is not where the money is..Not even at the $2000 price point. If they want to play in the big leagues they have to corner the entry level enthusiast market-I don't believe smart phones are going to kill this market. People still want to carry a 'better' camera than in the phone.. Furthermore, the Sony name doesn't carry the gravitas to entice John Smith tourist to swing a Sony over his neck on the next European vacation.

Sony certainly has options in the "entry-level enthusiast market", even with FF. They have the A7 which is only $798, the A7II which is only $1598, and the A7III which is $1998. All are available new. In APS-C, they have the A6000 for $548, A6300 for $898, and the A6500 for $1398.

As for tourists on their next European vacation, I went to Portugal and Spain a few months ago, and I saw tons of tourist using Sony cameras (I was one of them)! Before that I took a cruise on Royal Caribbean’s ship Harmony of the Seas, currently the world's largest cruise ship (a truly stunning ship). I saw a surprising many people using Sony A6XXX and A7-series cameras. Tourists don't buy cameras based on "gravitas", hahaha! Most buy based on features, value, capability, size, weight, etc.

Every year I travel abroad, I see fewer and fewer DSLRs, more and more smartphones and mirrorless cameras. The days of lugging around a chunky DSLR are rapidly waning.

"I don't believe smart phones are going to kill this market"I believe you are wrong. The entry level market will continue to shrink and Sony is right to get ahead of it even if that means some lost opportunity short term. Right now Sony and Fuji are the two companies best prepared for the future. Canon is waking up a little bit while Nikon is still napping. Micro 4/3 is in the most vulnerable position in my opinion even though they have some great products.

"Micro 4/3 is in the most vulnerable position in my opinion even though they have some great products."

to my knowledge no IS system work as well as Olympusif that continue, Olympus no worrysomeone like me with Sony A6500, if i look at 100% , most 1/60 pics (all pics above ISO 100) is either soft or blur

"to my knowledge no IS system work as well as Olympusif that continue, Olympus no worry"I bet Olympus wishes their very good IS alone would keep them relevant but I don't think it will. I have to admit that Olympus has the most brilliant marketing team and they have more than earned their paycheck getting so many people to believe that f2.8 and IBIS combined with a 4/3 sensor means you're magically playing with the big boys but the reality is quite different. In some scenarios it might be true but when you can buy the A7III for about the same as the E-M1 II and cover many more scenarios then it's a hard sell. And while stabilization is sometimes useful it's also one of the most overrated features ever marketed. IBIS is important for m4/3 just to try to stay relevant but it's not enough IMO but only time will tell. Smartphones and compact cameras are going to push m4/3 to the limit and to some extent aps-c as well.

Well if you're taking a very high percentage of pictures at 1/60 of subjects that aren't moving and that need more DoF then I'm sure it isn't overrated. For the other 98% of us that isn't the case. I'd much rather have the high ISO, dynamic range, resolution of full frame combined with f1.4 or f1.8 to go along with stabilization because of the overall versatility. There might be a few situations where I would have benefited from the better stabilization of m4/3 but there will be significantly more where I benefit from the full frame combination and I believe that is true for the majority of people. But if your style of photography relies so heavily on stabilization with more DoF then maybe m4/3 is for you but I don't believe there will be enough of you to keep m4/3 from being vulnerable as the market for entry level and lower cost cameras disappears - and- at the same time Sony keeps raising the bar for full frame and Nikon and Canon enter that market.

dear sony , if you truly want to make lenses that are forever put working aperture dials and helicoid focus mechanism on some of them, its been shown that this can coexist along side automated versions of lens control functions of iris and focus

Would be a very positive step for Sony if they made their higher end "pro" camera bodies larger (better ergonomics, build quality & weather sealing).. I think this is the main reason more pro's have not made the plunge. That being said, Canon and possibly Nikon are more than likely coming up with their own "entry, mid and pro" full frame mirrorless/hybrid bodies very soon, and I would expect them to build them as they have before... solid, weather sealed and comfortable to hold, regardless of which market they for.

I don't shoot sports, I do. ;-) Actually I was listen to many people and got a A700 in the beginning, then a Nex 5, a Ricoh GR and now I use a RX1r II. The Ricoh is still my preferred size but it was not good enough in low light and dynamic range. In travel much, four month per year, and size and weight matters, if you travel l like me. I tried to use my phone but it is still only good enough for snapshots.

I search now something for video, but the A7 is still too big. Maybe a improved RX100. I really hope that the software from the phones(HDR) is coming to the compact cameras.

Very much like the Ricoh GRII.. have been shooting with one since the original film GR. It’s the camera that is always with me. But for “serious” shooting... I need more than the 28mm fixed... also a larger sensor. The Rx1RII couldn't deal with the menu, focusing, fixed lens and ergonomics. The Canon m50 has 4k (cropped) and is quite small. Ricoh is rumored to be coming up with a GRIII by end of year.

I don't do video... if the GRIII would add a zoom of around 20mm-70mm (35mm equivalent) with the sharpness quality of the GRII.. would be all over it. Meanwhile something like the M6 is quite tempting.. but not quite what I need, so holding off a bit. Lumix I hear much good about their video... their size/ergo might also be right in the niche U need.

Personally I find the Canon M quite underwhelming but a GR with very good video would be tempting, if the digital zoom for video is good. But I think this will not be happen, Pentax is not very famous for good video. And for photography I have the Rx1.

back in the day i lived my ricoh gx 200 with zoom it was noisy at iso 400 , but i still loved that camera

it had a 1 \1.7 sensor , a poor one so i shot at iso 64 to 200 , but a really good 24 -72 equiv lens ... that was a decade ago , its iq by todays standards was awful'hell it was criticized in its own day .....still black and white at iso 400 and above was like a time machine

I don't think small bodies are what's holding them back. Some people have big hands, some people have small hands. It's a matter of personal preference and there are plenty of people on both sides. Meanwhile, Canon and Nikon have both gone for big, chunky cameras in their pro lines, so for the high-end customer who's looking for a smaller full-frame body, Sony might have an edge.

@anticipation_of .. the size of the camera is directly correlated with size of battery, sensor size, cpu, amount of weather sealing, size of controls... The original Sony full frame cameras were frankly too small to properly implement/facilitate what was needed for a professional body. I expect their next iterations to become even larger to make up what short comings they still have to their professional DSLR competitors.

That doesn't really sound right to me. The newer Alphas all have generous batteries, the processors are as potent as anything else, and obviously the sensor is the same size as in any other full-frame camera. I know Sony needs to work on its UX in general but if small buttons are the problem this is the first I've heard of it.

To be honest I think a lot of people around here forget that women are half the population, and that they tend to have smaller hands than men. Also, Asian people tend to be built a bit smaller than your average DPR reader, and that's a huge chunk of the camera market as well. Professional photography has long been dominated by white men, but that's changing. Companies that make cameras would be wise to take that into account.

It's about finding a balance between build quality, performance, IQ , weight etc. Pro canons and Nikons are not built that large because they are not able/don't have the know how to build smaller, but for what pro's put their cameras through. They need to be built like tanks, have the extra battery life, better weather sealing etc. Also they do feel much better in the hand (large or small) then Sony's do. The larger size of the Nikon D5 and Eos 1DX facilitates all these needs, and is designed to be comfortable also with large lenses. Some amateurs/enthusiasts will time and time again bring up the "argument" that large telephotos have a tripod/monopod collar so all the weight is there and that somehow the whole balance issues with a small Sony body are all made up, they are simply wrong, blowing smoke. As before mentioned.. I see in the future for full frame mirrorless a size 15% larger than what Sony offers... 15% smaller than Canons 5D series as the "sweet spot"

cont. The idea that a professional sports photographer-wildlife photographer is lugging around 20kg of large glass and wants a body that is smaller (300g lighter).. at the expense of comfort, grip and durability is absurd. I do understand though the idea of diversity. Having a camera body that is not as bulky as a 1dx II if you shooting a wedding, landscape, event etc. , and not using very large lenses. Having the option to add the battery grip if you are going to be working with large lenses certainly makes more sense.

seriously , the dslr is dependant upon a mirrorbox and a separate prism or mirror device both using up precious volume and adding serious mass

mirrrorless cameras have neither and this is the basis for most of the size and weight differences seen , additionally mirrorless have been given smaller batteries, for the most part , adding to the weight disparity

it's not a journalistic endeavor. It's a web site that when all is said and done was purchased by amazon to promote camera sales. (not impugning their integrity; the amazon relation ownership is clearly stated). It's like if a chrysler dealership purchased the NYT then the NYT interviewed lee iacoca (or whoever is currently running chrysler into the ground). Dpreview is all about maintaining a positive relationship with the big guys. I'm guessing sony may even have had a chance to preview this and make "clarifications".

These industry guys are simply not going to even sit down for an interview if they think the interviewer is going to be antagonistic. This isn't investigative journalism, it's an industry event; of course the questions are softballs. That's nothing against DPR, it's just how these things work. DPR actually asked some fairly direct questions here, they just didn't push back very hard against some of the less direct answers.

As a reader, you have to read between the lines and take what the company rep has to say with a grain of salt. That's not to say that you can never learn anything useful from these things, but you have to account for the context.

Sigma releases a few lenses. I think that Sigma, Samyang, Tamron etc. are more important because the drive the price down. Personally I would like to have one mount. This system religion is quite strange.

PEOPLE LOVE FULL FRAME, for the stupid moniker that has been attached to it by pundits full frame what ? its name the name for 35mm format [24x36mm], used to be called "miniature format" by those shooters bygone when cameras were cameras and photographers were photographers,lol

I propose dpr stop referring to these as full frame and call them small formatbecause the simple fact is tht it is distinctly smaller than, well , medium format the other formats cam be called.....apsc [nikon fuji sony pentax] apsc lite [canon] m43 [olympus , panny] and lentil format [ cellphones]

Increased competition is good no matter which brand it comes from. Hopefully that'll fuel further development at rival companies giving customers better equipment, no matter if one is entrenched with canikon, sony, m43, fuji or pentax.

checked out a sony setup with a 500mm f4. nikon D850 with a 500mm f4 was lighter and cheaper then a sony 7R3 with their 500mm f4. so nikon is at this moment in time cheaper, lighter and is proven tech. might be the reason why its still outselling the 7R3 series,.

The D850 is currently ranked #15 in ILC sales at Amazon while the A7RIII is ranked #16. The fact that the Sony is just one notch below the Nikon shows just how much the market has changed in the last few years. It shouldn't even be close, considering Nikon's MUCH larger userbase! This should be worrying Nikon.

As for size and weight, let's not be disingenuous. The A7RIII is definitely lighter and smaller than a D850. Compare the size of an A7RIII + FE 24-70/2.8 versus a D850 + 24-70/2.8 VR (no need for VR on the Sony lens thanks to IBIS):

A 24-70/2.8 lens is going to be MUCH more widely used than a 500/4! It is far more likely to be carried around for regular handheld shooting, whereas a 500/4 is mainly just going to be on a monopod or tripod where weight is far less of an issue! The Sony setup is definitely more compact and lighter: 1543g vs 2075g. The Nikon setup is huge and heavy.

Mirrorless FF system has no weight or size advantage compared to DSLRs if you use professional f2.8 lenses or telephoto lenses. If one is trying to decide between mirrorless or DSLR with telephoto or professional f2.8 zoom lenses, I'd advise to consider ergonomy, lens quality, AF performance etc.. before weight.

@underxposed59 - Well, keep in mind that Nikon users were making the exact same argument against Canon back in the late 1980's/early 1990's when Canon EOS was still relatively new. "Buy Nikon over Canon EOS. It's a no brainer because Nikon as 10 times (maybe 100 times) the user base!"

If you're already carrying a 500mm lens, how much does camera weight really matter? Your kit is going to be heavy and bulky no matter whose system you're using. Factor in a tripod or monopod and the difference is even smaller.

@anticipation_of - Not everyone uses ONLY a 500mm lens ALL THE TIME. People do use other lenses. Sometimes, camera size/weight matters, sometimes it doesn't. Being able to have a camera that is on a 500mm lens one day, then be able to use it as an unobtrusive street/reportage camera the next day offers a wider degree of versatility. I would much rather have a camera that I can ADD size/weight to than to have a camera that I can't REMOVE size/weight from! No matter what you do, the D850 is always going to be a 1 kilogram behemoth of a camera that sticks out like a sore thumb wherever you go. It's always going to scream, "Hey look at me, I'm a big camera!" which is not what you want all the time (or at least it's not what I want all the time).

@T3. let me point out that your weight argument is discussing the weight of a can of cola. the reason why pro shooters pick Nikon over Sony is because of the ergonomics and menu setup. most pro's say that the sony menu is horrible. the battery life,. its less horrible then version 2, now its only terrible. how about that SD card ? i mean really . big news you can now use two old tech SD cards. but when you buffer is clearing, wait , wait , wait , wait , wait, you cant enter the menu or see what you shot. the whole discussion feels like the discussion between apple/windows users or IOS/Android users or between Nikon/Sony users. but did you notice you didnt mention any of the other digital camera's ? the times we are in right now is that the mirrorless tech is catching up to proven tech of the DSLR. its without doubt that mirrorless is the future. but right now its not there yet. the current ILC market is in transition from DSLR to mirrorless. feels like the end of the 90s.

@T3. regarding your arguments. Nikon is D850 is outselling the Sony 7R3. when i look at B and H or others like link below i see nikon is kicking as-s. even doh there is no discussion the Sony 7R3 is a great camera, sales show what the market wants. check the link. it shows you that even up to februari the sales for nikon are at spot 1.

"Market Bolstered by Exceptional Demand for the Award-Winning Full Frame (FX-format) D850 DSLR"

E-Mount is not an open standard. To obtain it you must be approved of by Sony and you must sign an agreement to license it from them. At most you may be able to say that licensing E-mount is free. It says so right on their web site:

Just wonder What would happen in the future to the still big dslr comunity who love big camera bodies such as the Ff dslr or big apsc. I mean all those big lenses, the weather sealed construction, people with big hands, the good balance between a big exótic lens with a big camera, ergonomics,etc. Could the manufactures produce smaller lenses with similar óptics quality as the big exotic or medium size lenses for dslr? I mean there aré obvious advantages of mirrorless cameras and is going to be the future but there still a long way to go with long telephoto lenses in the 300-600mm Range for mirrowless. In the apsc mirrowless market i saw the Samsung nx1 as the perfect camera but it seems manufactures aré producing even smaller and slimer that that camera. What does people really want? A ff mirrowless with the weight of a point and shoot camera for theirHikings ?

You can make mirrorless cameras as big as you want to. They just won't have that deep cavernous cavity in the middle of the body where the mirror box currently resides. For example, look at the Leica SL. It has a grip that is at least as big and deep as a 5DSR

I dunno, every time a new MFT camera comes out there's a huge chorus of "BUT IT'S AS BIG AS A DSLR!" around here. So it's obvious that you can make a large mirrorless camera, and presumably some people like them that way for the ergonomics. I think Sony is smart to make their FF mirrorless cameras small, though. It differentiates them from the competition and highlights one of the potential advantages of the mirrorless paradigm, even if it's only an advantage by preference. Some customers will always be attracted to a more compact camera body. Perhaps when Canon and Nikon do their FF mirrorless bodies, they'll stick to a more traditional form factor to preserve their traditional ergonomics.

I've repeatedly postponed purchasing a FF Sony, as good ergonomics, decent weather-sealing and high durability are all more important to me that a modest gain in DR or a marginal improvement in high ISO noise performance.

I hope Sony take it on board that these factors are extremely important for sports and wildlife photographers, but it looks like we'll have to wait at least another couple of years before they produce bodies that are big enough and tough enough to cope with pro requirements.

... and maybe, JUST maybe, Canon might get there first, with a mirrorless body design based on 5DMkiv. Even if they release such a mirrorless body with a sensor no better than that in the 5DMkiv, it would be a killer camera, as it would have all the features that pros need, and natively accept EF lenses with total compatibility..

I sympathise, and I'd love to be able to pay less, but Canon products are always over-priced, so that's not likely to change. Canon have proven that a huge number of people are willing to pay that premium. Whether or not it is good value is another matter. And, whether or not you are willing to pay it is entirely your choice.

The ironic thing is all Canon actually needs to do is add focus peaking to Live View and 90% of Sony's products would be obsolete.DPAF could be a bit faster, but it sounds like that won't take long to get sorted.

If they can make a hybrid EVF/OVF I think Sony will be in a lot of trouble.

I'm holding off on investing in a lens system for pretty much the reasons you outline. Sony's FF cameras right now are extremely impressive technically but a bit unrefined in other ways, while Canon and Nikon have some catching up to do. (Sorry Pentax, you're not in the running.) In another two or three years I think the camera landscape is going to look quite different and it's anybody's guess who will be the leader. That's why I went with a bridge camera when I decided it was time to get serious about my photography again; it'll keep me occupied for the next 2-3 years while I develop my skills and wait for the competition to shake out a bit. And anyway, they do have their advantages.

@9VIII - Really? You think the only thing that Canon needs to do is add focus peaking to Live View and that would make "90% of Sony's products obsolete?" LOL. Be careful what you wish for because that's all that Canon might do! Hahaha. And then you'll see that your theory is totally wrong. As for "hybrid EVF/OVF", I can't see how that would work. You need a reflex mirror to have an OVF image, but if you have a reflex mirror then you are blocking the sensor that gives you the EVF image. Maybe you're talking about a pellicle mirror where half the light goes to the OVF and half the light goes to the image sensor to feed the EVF, but then you'd have light loss.

I remember a time about 5 years ago when people were unimpressed with the current state of affairs at Canon, specifically with the 6D. People, myself included started saying things like "all Canon needs to do is pop a full frame sensor into a 70D body and BAM!, KILLER 6D Mark II. Well, that's more or less what Canon did. The problem was, it took them 5 damn years to do it and they also "taketh away" in the process. Canon has a very different philosophy from Sony. Canon gives the absolute bare minimum they think they can get away with. Sony, on the other hand, packs every single feature they can into their cameras, product segmentation be damned. They're polar opposites when it comes to feature inclusion. And that's the reason why Canon had to drop the price of the 6D Mark II by approximately half just a couple of months after launch while Sony's A7III is being hailed as the camera for everyone. Same initial price point, by the way.

Mirrorless cannot accept natively SLR lenses because of flange distance. Or you increase the flange distance to match the existing lenses.Also the mirrorless have to provide some PDAF on sensor to have decent AF for the lenses that are designed for PDAF not CDAF.

Well Leica is still making rangefinder cameras, but there are not many people buying them, are there? I think Canon will continue to make DSLRs for many years, even when they will sell just very little of them and at a high prise. There will always people who prefer the past over the future....

Until they can solve the rolling shutter problem there isn't much point in using Mirrorless over an SLR.A purely electronic camera body with effectively infinite shutter life is highly appealing, but no-one is making those yet.

Yes the A9 looks great but Sony needs to make this universal across their entire product line.The funny thing about all the comments around Sony being so innovative with their rapid release cycle is that they actually aren't, and outside of the A7 they don't have a rapid release cycle, they just had a lot of product segments left empty until recently.The A6000 and A5100 have been on the market for four years without an update and the A6300 and A6500 are just vastly more expensive products competing in an entirely different category.Sony themselves have said that they have no desire to upgrade their entry level models because of a lack of competition.Reality is in those segments Sony has already reached a "comfortable" market position and already they've become just as sedated as everyone says Canon is.

@9VIII - You only need to eliminate rolling shutter if you want to shoot with electronic shutter, and you shoot faster-moving subjects. I am a DSLR owner who mainly only shoots mirrorless now, and I've never used electronic shutter. I don't think I will ever buy another DSLR in my lifetime, but I certainly will be buying mirrorless cameras in the future. And the absence of rolling shutter would definitely be a bonus, but it's certainly not a deal killer for me.

@Barney Britton and DPR staff, thanks for this interview. Some new stuff came up like Sonys thinking of weather proofing.

Next time, please take these questions with you:

Will there ever be a better A-mount adapter for Screw mount lenses? The LA-EA4 is getting rather old. Preferably an adapter with AF-motor but without the need for the translucent mirror that uses the on sensor PDAF for focus measurement for the lenses that needs that (and that also can act like the LA-EA3).

Also please ask if they plan to implement functions that other camera manufacturers like Panasonic, Olympus and Pentax has built in, like time lapse function in camera. Pro Capture mode (Olympus name), Live View Bulb/Composite modes (also Oly) and focus bracketing (and stacking). And Astro tracer with the IBIS like Pentax has (with a Star Eater off mode).

Finally, will they ever implement a focus wide open mode for those that need to shot on apertures below f8 and still wants to have PDAF AF?

I'm excited to see what Canon and Nikon have to compete against Sony. I like my Sony a6300 but I mainly shoot my D750 now because of the variety of lenses for it versus what I can find for my a6300, and the corresponding price of those lenses. I'm very happy there's such strong competition across these remnants of the ILC market.

Check Canon lenses or EF-mount variations of third parties. Also, some Nikon lenses do work well with the latest/firmware updatable adapters. I use EF- and A-mount lenses all the time on my A6300s, along with native E-mount. The A6300 was the first APS-C Sony that could use adapters well. Especially Sony's own LA-EA1/3.

No.I don’t see that the difference in design/engineering would be so costly,and I understand what a great capability the a9 has.Maybe the smaller market for the a9 is the justification for such a large difference in price or Sony knows if you absolutely need all the specs you will pay up.

@jackspra - The price of a product is never just based on the cost of parts. Company charge what they think they can get. Besides, the A9 is already a lot less expensive ($4500) than the 1DXII ($6000) and D5 ($6500), in spite of having a more advanced sensor, 5-axis IBIS, no viewfinder blackout, no rolling shutter, faster shooting speed, etc. The A9 has a very advanced back-illuminated stacked CMOS with a very fast read-out. And the camera's processor can handle the 20fps output of the image sensor. There's a lot of new tech in there. Don't be fooled by the fact that these cameras look similar from the outside.

The A9 has a better body with a more complex build, and a unique sensor that merges the sensor itself with a memory buffer to significantly improve data transfer off the sensor. That's the most expensive part, especially at FF size.

"It was very reassuring to hear Mr. Tanaka stress the importance of durability…"

I actually got the opposite read from his response to that question—I thought he downplayed the importance of durability, rather than stressing it. And I'm sure he knows as well as anyone that his line about photographers not wanting to use their cameras in poor conditions is nonsense. My take on that was that he was trying hard not to admit that Sony has neglected this area of camera design, and needs to do better. He can't openly criticize his own team though, so he spun it as a matter of seeking balance and understanding the needs of their customers. It was reasonably deft, but it was still a deflection.

osv - So your take on the world is that the only people who are capable of talking sense are people who own Sony devices? That doesn't say much does it?

Regarding Sony durability, the weather-resistance test by IR proved beyong doubt that Sony cameras cannot survive a few drops of rain, unlike Canon, Nikon and Olympus which all passed with flying colours.

By comparison, professional Canon and Nikon gear receives a lot of knocks and bangs, occasionally gets dropped, and is often used in light rain, or in conditions of extremely humidity, yet it usually manages to survive for several years.

I don't believe any Sony product would last more than a few months in the hands of a pro wildlife, sports or press photographer. I really, really don't (and I don't think you do either, if you are honest with yourself).

I shoot on a Sony RX10 IV, which I love (and it is listed in my profile, FWIW) and I don't participate in the forums because I am just not that into DPR; I read the articles and sometimes comment, but I don't "live" here to to speak. Feel free to look up my photography on Instagram though, I go by the same handle over there. I recently posted a panorama of a sunrise in the White Mountains of New Hampshire which I'm quite proud of!

And there, just for you I even put a few of my recent photos up on my gallery. Had to install Flash and everything. By the way, what's up with your upload widget requiring Flash, DPR? Flash is a terrible program and a nasty security risk.

Oh nevermind, you can view them more or less as they're meant to be seen if you click Original. That starling one doesn't really hold up (that was shot handheld at 600mm equivalent and then cropped in fairly heavily) but the two landscapes look pretty much like they should.

osv - Your comments are among the most uninformed and ludicrous of those so far in 2018. I'd go into details and prove just how ridiculous they are, but clearly nothing that anyone else says is capable of penetrating your head.

you don't know icl=interchangeable lens,you don't know dcam = digicamnot all dcams offer LV, since 1996, but most do by now

no one is "complaining" about LV=liveview (generically)except:there are two types:framing-LV (old style casio+kodak, pentax, etc)live exposure preview (WYSIWYG) LV: Canon, Sonynot all dcams offer WYSIWYG-LV, even with an evf (like nikon 1)electronic viewfinders only offer LV (but you must know which type, see above)much like rearscreens of LV dcams

LV suffer LAG-vision, even on Sony A7+A9 (regardless of whether LV is via Rearscreen or EVF)

blackouts show up on A9 when buffer fills, and it is a way of blocking "any view" for tracking subjects (while waiting for buffer to clear)

Having those developing AF, LV and video abilities just visually available for the LCD only, is by far the largest issue for DSLR's. Especially when it comes to fast paced stuff that requires those burst speeds.

so development of AF for LV is uninterrupted progress, whether for LV dSLRs or for icl mirrorless dcams

if you don't get that connection, you will think "mirrorless" tech is "new"when in fact, it is as old as videocam tech of previous centuryexcept much improved (obviously, for both stills + video, even for low light and shallow dof, and low contrast conditions)

It's not about it being new, it about it being more usable plus a more seamless switch when you use either the viewfinder or LCD.

OSPDAF developments really brought it to the large sensor ILC's, since it made it useful with millions of existing lenses out there, where CDAF only was more of a gimmick with those (jerkiness galore). So in that sense, there indeed is a new wave of LV ILC's.

True, but as the 1Dxii is a DSLR, it means you only have blackout-free LV when composing via the rear screen. Sports and wildlife photographers want blackout-fee 16fps via the VIEWFINDER. You can only have that with mirrorless (which also gives you silent shutter, which is extremely useful in some fields of high burst-rate photography).

The OVF mirror-blackout on my 5DS, 5DMkiv and on the 1DXii bodies that I sometimes hire, is sufficiently off putting to make it difficult to visually track a subject such as a bird in flight. It can be overcome to some extent by keeping both eyes open, but a blackout-free EVF would make visual tracking much easier. It isn't much use having top-notch AF tracking, if you can't follow the subject by eye in the viewfinder.

DPR has become a platform for a lot of nonsense comments from ... fanboys of competitive brands who hate alternative brands that is not what they use or, perhaps they are paid by somebody to come and write these nonsense. If I was the one who makes decisions at DPR, I would have changed their forum policies creating a better environment here. I would have probably removed these nonsense comments; warn and remove repetitive offenders. I wish someday we will have a healthy environment on DPR where constructive discussions help users in their questions and problems instead of wasting all this effort and energy on nonsense talk from people who have chosen to be part of a propaganda machinery of the competition. These kind of talks do no good to genuine photographers who want to improve their work. Let's hope one day, this forum will become a place for mature people.

I had one guy who basically said he was going to stalk me for life,just because I said Apple are ripping off people with the cost of those little connectors for headphones without the lightning connector.I had a lot of fun with that one.

I wish someday we will have a healthy environment on DPR where constructive articles help users in their questions and problems instead of wasting all this effort and energy on nonsense talk from people who have chosen to be part of a propaganda machinery of Sony.These kind of puff pieces do no good to genuine photographers who want to improve their work. Let's hope one day, this website will become a place for mature people.

"As if that wasn't enough, Sony can actually sell its sensors to all the camera manufacturers instead of competing with them."

That's not much of an argument because it's no different from what they are already doing with DSLRs! Sony sells tons of sensors to other DSLR manufacturers. But the reality is that ILC sensor sales are small compared to the money Sony makes from selling sensors to smartphone manufacturers. Sony smartphone camera sensor sales far eclipse ILC sensors many times over.

Well, Sony Imaging (independent from Sony Semiconductor, who make the sensors) is quite healthy and profitable. So there is a reason, albeit a mysterious and incomprehensible one - they make money selling cameras!

One might just write it off as semantics, but i have one issue with the claim that ML tech needs to be sought to advance the camera industry. If that's the case, then Sony thinks there are zero place for ML without an EVF, which includes their own models like the A5100. Why?

Simple, a DSLR is literally a mirrorless camera when in LV mode. I would say maybe it's smart to advance LV tech, but i don't consider that "mirrorless" tech. Again, maybe semantics, but i don't think you necessarily have to ditch the DSLR to gain benefits of LV. For many users there's a place for both.

I certainly know and appreciate the benefits of some LV features, having used and owned them many times. But i also appreciate the benefits of a DSLR, more so even, which is why if i have to choose one or the other, i choose a DSLR. Maybe in time i won't have to choose, which is why i disagree with this Sony guy.

Short of a lack of an EVF, a 6DII type camera is everything a ML could be for me, plus a DSLR.

A DSLR is functionally a mirrorless camera in live-view, yes, but it is more complicated, making it heavier & more expensive and giving it more ways to fail. Keeping DSLR going is only worthwhile so long as the mirror is worth the cost. Also, no EVF on a DSLR unless you make a hybrid viewfinder, adding more expense.

Max ISO - I don't think it's realistic to expect a hybrid DSLR/mirrorless. A much better idea IMHO would be make a FF mirrorless that was based the on the same body design and control layout as a Canon 5DMkiv or Nikon D850.

That way we'd have the ergonomics, durability and lens system inherited from the DSLRs, but we'd dump the heavy pentaprism and noisy mirror, replacing them with a high resolution EVF.

Silent shutter, no mirror blackout, reduced vibration, fewer mechanical parts, live histogarm etc, all in a body that had proven ergonomics and durability, and was compatible with the Canon or Nikon lens systems.

Ace, that's not necessarily true. Canon already have an addon EVF, if they chose to they could write a simple FW upgrade for any DSLR to let the hotshoe power the EVF, and since many of their DSLRs now have dual pixel, it would work quite well.

Any DSLR can be fitted in this way, it's just a matter of the quality of the LV. If the LV experience is dismal, probly not much demand for such developments, but as DSLRs improve their LV designs, i don't think this would be a bad idea.

@Entoman, i agree keeping the exact same design would be a good idea, and i hope it's what Canon does. If all other things were equal i would also prefer to have the advantages you mention like silent mode and such. But, all other things are not equal.

As it is with DSLR designs of today, we could still have all those features, without removing the OVF. Simply use the LCD and all is well. An addon EVF as i mention above would solve the shading issue. We can't say the reverse if we remove the OVF, so battery life is toast.

If i have to choose between the two, i choose a DSLR. If i can have both in one package, all the better. If nothing else i will keep a DSLR of my choice (eventually probably a D3s) and just add a ML body for the few times it's preferable.

Max Iso - An accessory EVF that went in the hotshoe would be a good idea, but frankly, Canon are never going to do that. Canon is in the business of making money. They have 3 options regarding EVF on FF cameras:

1) a DSLR with a clip-on EVF as you suggested. This can't be done by firmware to existing DSLRs, as there is no internal electrical connection from the sensor to the hotshoe. It would require a completely new DSLR.

2) a DSLR with a hybrid OVF/EVF, such as Canon already have under patent, in which the mirror is locked up and a micro-EVF is viewed through the normal eyepiece via a prism. This could happen but the cost would be horrendous.

3) a full size mirrorless FF camera based on existing DSLR ergonomics, but with an EVF replacing the prism and mirrorbox. This would be the design most likely to appeal to most existing Canon DSLR users, and it would be the cheapest to design and implement.

I think one of the hardest problems for mirrorless to solve is giving us viewfinders with 100% noise-free images regardless of light level, absolutely zero lag, and with the dynamic range of the human eye. Until that trifecta happens, there will probably always be a market for cameras with OVFs. Maybe they can eventually come up with some sort of excellent hybrid system.

Current EVF's aren't horrible, and they have their advantages (such as focus peaking) but try using them in extremely low light, or point them at a high contrast situation and it is hard not to wish for an OVF back. My first thought after looking through a A9 viewfinder was "How can this be on a $4500 camera?" Obviously some people are fine with it but I just can't get used to how poor the viewfinder image quality is - it cheapens the whole experience too much for me, especially attached to an otherwise capable camera.

Am I the only one who can't see clearly through the OVF under "extremely low light"? I'd rather see a noisy image than almost complete darkness.Also turn off all the lights and observe surroundings with your own eyes, and you will see noise. Physics doesn't only rule how camera works. It's not a big deal.

Current EVF's are amazing, especially when compared to the first generation. I was once an anti-EVF guy and swore I'd never buy one, that I'd shoot OVF till I die. I've had to eat those words. Shooting in low light, EVF's are absolutely brilliant.

OVF vs EVF is largely a matter of what you're used to, or simply prefer. I consider a camera as a tool to make photos and will use whatever helps in making them better. I get better results in just about any situations using an EVF with the histogram enabled. And by the way,I know some people who prefer using their DSLR in live view in low light.

Maybe the settings of the EVF you looked through were bad. With the right contrast/brightness settings it should be indistuingishable from an OVF in normal conditions and better than an OVF in low light.

Not even close. I have used fairly recent EVF designs, including on the A77II and GX8, both pretty high end EVFs. Not even close to indistinguishable. Not the worst experiences mind you but if i have my choice, im OVF every time.

If i were a manual focus guy i would definitely be in the EVF camp. But im not. Maybe your eyesight is bad? I can easily tell the difference, that's part of it. I like the way an OVF looks, bc it looks like real life.

An EVF gives real time exposure, so to speak, but i can't dial in EVF settings to make it look like my final processed version, so it's not really a WYSIWYG. An estimation sure, but i can get that with accurate metering on any camera.

Aesthetically, i prefer optical. If one day there's an EVF that i can't tell is an EVF, then there's just battery life to fix. Still a long way off.

@monked, so you don't use the LCD for AP? Im no AP guru but what i have done is always loads easier using the LCD, and DSLRs have an LCD. Improve the DSLR LCD and you magically have a camera that's every good as "ML".

I keep saying it, short of needing a shaded LV screen (EVF), a DSLR can be what a ML is, and also be a DSLR. Best of both worlds, better battery life when you don't need LV, and LV for when you do.

@Fabian, what about very fast action (e. g.basketball, when you're shooting from behind the baseline)? Does the EVF keep up, at a resolution high enough for you to see clearly what's going on despite, say, backlight from the officials' table or the overhead lights?

I typically shoot about 2000 frames per game. To be on the safe side, I'd need at least 1500 frames (to allow changing batteries at halftime). My 7DII gets upwards of 4000 frames. I could shoot two games on it, although I usually change batteries before or during the second game just to be on the safe side.

I would rather have a noisy EVF image in low light than an image I can't even see (with an OVF) in low light. When the light gets low, it gets low in an OVF too. There is no luminance gain in an OVF like there is with an EVF.

@osv Interesting and quite impressive. My actual use case is indoors in a rather poorly lit (1/800 at f/2.8 for ISO 6400) gym. I'm using f/2.8 zoom lenses, which is what I need for the wide range in subject distances.

@robert krawitz - a 70-200/2.8 would have given me more accurate coverage as well, but in looking at the f2.8 stuff that i shot, some of the backgrounds are still too distracting, i'd rather take the coverage hit, for thinner dof.

plus, unlike dslr af, which is as good as it can get by f/2.8, ospdaf on sony mirrorless benefits from faster apertures like f/1.8

@Robert Krawitz I don't normally shoot sports and fast action but fwiw I tried your use case with ISO6400, an f2.8 lens and an a99 (same viewfinder and similar sensor as the first gen a7). At 1/800 the VF image looks fine when I move the camera around quickly. At 1/200 it's also still fine. At 1/100 it starts to degrade. At 1/50 you can see smearing and stuttering which limits its use to static objects. I'm guessing with the a7III and it's high ISO capabilities or the a9 you can go 1-2 stops further. The sensor noise performance is very important for the quality of the viewfinder image in extreme low light.

@osv If that's shot at ISO 3200 and 1/1600, it's more than 2 stops brighter than what I have to work with. If you look carefully, you'll see that even 1/800 isn't really fast enough; I should consider pushing the ISO up and go for even faster shutter speed.

Moving the camera quickly isn't the same thing as subjects moving.

(Coast Guard's photographer told me he always hates shooting in our venue because the light's so bad; I could hardly take issue with his comment.)

i agree 100% about the shutter speed, i try to be at 1/2500th whenever possible, 1/800th is the bare minimum... some of that softness in those pics is autofocus-related, which newer cameras will improve on.

@Max Iso"Not even close. I have used fairly recent EVF designs, including on the A77II and GX8, both pretty high end EVFs. Not even close to indistinguishable."

I think it's a lot like film vs digital photography. Yeah, there's a difference. Especially in the early days. I remember us film shooters *hated* how digital looked. These days it's a non-issue. The same will eventually happen with EVF. Fewer and fewer people will care that EVF doesn't look "indistinguishable" from OVF. It's its own thing, just like digital is its own thing. Today, we have a whole generation that doesn't even know what film looks like, and likewise, there will be a whole generation that doesn't know what OVF looks like. They'll be digital native, all the way: digital photography, digital viewfinders.

I wonder, do OVF users ever realize the big drawbacks of their preferred viewfinder? Resolution isn't anywhere near what the naked eye sees, thanks to ground glass being in the middle of all. Modern OVF's are optimized for apertures f/2.8 and below, meaning that one doesn't see the actual DoF with fast primes. Stopping down quickly degrades the view, and can dim the viewfinder to the point of being useless.The optical paths can go out of whack, meaning that framing, DoF or both can be off regarding what the sensor captures.Grit gets in there. Thanks to the OVF being directly connected to the mirror box, that flappy mirror can send all sorts of garbage onto the ground glass and other optical interfaces.OVFs are a zero-sum game. Make them larger, and you lose coverage. Make coverage 100%, and you lose magnification. EVF panels can be made larger to taste, to a theoretical limit much, much higher than OVFs.Shall I continue? I'm out of space here, but not out of points to make.

Kharan i wonder things too, like why is the default suspicion that people haven't tried EVFs. My first ILC ever had an EVF. 2 of my first 3 ILC had an EVF. In the last 6 years since i got into photography i have owned 5 cameras with EVFs. My opinions are born of real world experience with both formats, and multiple brands in each.

As for not showing the DOF, hasn't been an issue for me. I suppose if you have no idea what the DOF will be like for the actual shot, having visual aids is nice. I don't need it. For people less skilled in composition and such, yes that may be nice.

We all know how an OVF works, and despite all the "drawbacks" you list for an OVF, we somehow manage to take photos with them. Amazing !

You forget one last point to make too, the bigger and higher rez you make the EVFs, the more power hungry they become. If you add battery power to keep operation times even remotely close (operation time, not shot counts), the ML may very well be heavier. Yuck huh?

I never implied you didn't try an EVF. I don't care either way, really, but after hitting the limits of OVFs constantly, I just can't (willingly) go back.You probably chimp a lot, and if that's fine by you, well, great. I often don't have the time to chimp, especially when recording video, and for me the ability to eyeball DoF is invaluable. Also, losing the extra brightness and faint detail that a very fast prime affords on a good focusing screen is just sh*t - especially after having tried old-school OVFs optimized for that.Not amazing at all. People used to do photojournalism with Crown Graphics - that is mind-blowing! But when SLRs became affordable and commonplace, they dropped those things as if they had ebola. New, improved technologies displace older ones.I don't care about mirrorless size or power draw. I like big cameras - I just can't be bothered to work with a puny OVF anymore. I value mirrorless tech so much that I'm willing to put up with the poor grip.

@osv I'm guessing that that gym's actually better lit than ours, based on what I can see of the overhead lights and the fact that the walls are white. I don't care too much about dynamic range for this purpose; if the noise were much better, though, I'd first go for a faster shutter speed before. At home we wear our white uniforms, of course; at road games, the lighting's usually a lot better. The next basketball game I'm likely to shoot is our preseason exhibition against Harvard, and their place (Lavietes Pavilion) is well lit.

An EVF that ran down the battery in a hurry would be a real problem; likewise if it had any perceptible lag.

There's only one game left in the Division III basketball season, and alas, we're not playing tonight.

@Max Iso - "You forget one last point to make too, the bigger and higher rez you make the EVFs, the more power hungry they become."

In today's electronics-heavy world, I don't think the "power hungry" argument is very compelling anymore. It certainly hasn't prevented power hungry smartphones from taking over the world. And it certainly hasn't impeded the popularity of smartphones with larger screens. Yes a larger EVF may use a little more power, but I think a lot of people would be happy to enjoy a big beautiful EVF at the expense of a bit more power consumption. But I don't think the power consumption increase of a larger EVF would really be that much more, because we're literally talking about a difference of millimeters of increased size.

Actually one of the reasons i have an iphone 8+ instead of an LG G6 is battery life. The G5 was easily the worst i have had in many years for battery. Short of buying the addon for another 1200mAh, it was terrible, and the G6 doesn't have that optional addon.

Plenty of people consider battery life when choosing things. If you don't, that's your choice. Have you seen the big deal made about the new Sony Z batteries? If nobody cared you wouldn't have that kind of response from the ML crowd.

In typical DPR troll form, a particular feature or attribute is worthless, until the chosen brand or format gets it then it becomes worth having. I remember when the first A7 came out, it didn't even have E shutter. I remember having my GX7 and somebody was arguing with me how E shutter is worthless bc they had EFCS.

A year later the mark II had E shutter and those same people were talking about how great it was. Carry on.

@Max Iso - Sure battery life is important. But I don't think it's going to keep mirrorless from gaining popularity. Between 2016 and 2017, mirrorless went up by 1 million units while DSLRs went down by 700,000 units.

You also have to keep in mind that it's a LOT easier to swap batteries in a mirrorless camera than it is in a smartphone. Even with most smartphones that allow battery changes, it's not as convenient or easy as swapping batteries in an ILC camera. I have an LG G4 which has a removable battery, and it's still a far more annoying and tedious process to change the battery than it ever is with any camera. For one thing, powering on/off a smartphone takes a lot longer. So it's not really an apt comparison. Swapping batteries in a camera is super easy and fast.

Sales stats don't suggest what you seem to think. When i look at those numbers, i see DSLR users that are happier than ever and don't need to upgrade, while ML users are screaming for something better. Same as phone users, the format that has the highest turnover generation to generation.

DSLR sales are a victim of their own success. The tech is so mature and so well rounded that we don't need upgrades like we used to, it only makes sense the numbers will fall. ML will get there too some day.

And i agree a ML is easier than a phone with batteries. You know what's easier than that? Not having to even bring a spare. It's very liberating.

@Max Iso - "When i look at those numbers, i see DSLR users that are happier than ever and don't need to upgrade"

Haha, ok thanks Nostradamus.

There are people entering the ILC market every day. You seem to think that the only ILC sales that happen are to existing ILC users who are upgrading. The reality is that that's only a certain fraction of sales. There are people entering the market all the time, and these days I think a greater and greater percentage of those buyers are opting for mirrorless over a DSLR. And, of course, you have a certain percentage of people who are moving from DSLR to mirrorless (like me). Obviously, those people are not "DSLR users that are happier than ever", otherwise they would have stuck with DSLR. I don't think all DSLR users are as happy as you seem to think. Show me a DSLR that has face/eye AF, focus point coverage across the whole frame, histogram inside the viewfinder, real-time exposure feedback, shoots 11fps, etc. for under $2000?

"You know what's easier than that? Not having to even bring a spare. It's very liberating."

Yeah, because a spare battery is SOOO HUGE, and you are "liberated" from a 3 second battery change! Wow! I think you're blowing things way out of proportion. That is such a minor downside compared to the upside of having real-time exposure feedback, face/eye AF that basically eliminates the need for focus-lock-recompose that I was constantly doing with my DSLRs, a histogram in the viewfinder for ETTR, and a camera that is a lot more compact than a DSLR. For example, I use either an A6000 (344g) and an X-E1 (350g) as my daily carry. My old camera was a 60D (755g) which I still own. What's truly liberating is the considerable reduction in size and weight that these mirrorless cameras offer; I can truly have these cameras with me on most days in my messenger bag and barely even notice they are there! And you're making a big deal out of carrying a small spare battery? Come on, seriously?

When i had my GX7 in late 2017, i had a total of 5 batteries, for a couple reasons. One was i don't like being a slave to having to charge them every day, and if i have several spares im ok for a few days usually. But then that means i have to keep track of which are which, and i also only have one charger that came with the camera.

Can i buy an extra charger or two? Sure, but all the more to keep track of. I already have my AA chargers bc i already use Eneloops for my flashes. Like it or not, it's so much easier when you don't have to worry about swapping batteries after a couple hours of run time, and don't have to worry about the camera being too heavy for those wittle wrists.

"I don't think all ML users are as happy as you think. Show me a ML that has days worth of battery operation time, C-AF that can keep up with pro sports, a VF with ZERO lag, etc for under $600 used?"

I don't need to spend two grand to get usable C-AF, not to mention lenses...

For shooting sports, there simply isn't time to worry about getting focus perfectly on the eyes. Compact also doesn't matter when the camera is mounted on a 70-200 f/2.8, much less a really big lens. Battery life, however, does matter. Having to change batteries every 500 shots would be a problem. That's not half of a game, and at the Division III level we don't have media timeouts except in the playoffs (and I might want to use timeouts to get crowd shots). I don't even want to think about what shooting soccer would be like that way. Yes, of course I carry spare batteries. I'll change between games or at halftime if I think I might need to.

I'm not saying @T3 is wrong for his/her shooting, but it's not right for the majority of frames I shoot.

Max ISO: “Sales stats don't suggest what you seem to think. When i look at those numbers, i see DSLR users that are happier than ever and don't need to upgrade, while ML users are screaming for something better.”It’s just as you say! And it goes to show why DSLRs are unsustainable in the long run, users simply aren’t upgrading. Mirrorless will become prevalent if only because they’re a younger, less perfect tech, and so manufacturers can be certain of higher sales volumes down the road.

You are spot on Robert. Everybody has their own specific needs and preferences, but that fact seems lost on some of these guys. It's almost like when you run into a Sony guy, they are frothing at the mouth with the idea that 99% have to jump to ML or we are simply unreasonable.

I have been saying back before ML even had PDAF, i prefer big heavy cameras with the longest operation time battery life i can get (one thing im looking forward to when i eventually get a D3s, over 4k shot life).

And i have given smaller cameras with crap battery life more than a fair shake. I really enjoyed my GX7, but i don't want it for my ONLY rig, and since im not ready to support two systems at the moment, it had to go.

Im happy these guys are in love with So... errrr mirrorless, it's too bad they are hell bent on converting everybody to their world. Convert ye sinner, or thou shall surely perish in a fiery pit of mirrors ablaze !

Kharan, eventually DSLR makers will start to implement new features and tech. Nikon literally has yet to tap into any kind of LV improvement, and they are still #2 in the world. Canon doesn't even have E shutter on cameras that are sporting their amazing dual pixel.

Other than size (a very subjective attribute, i prefer big and heavy) and lens ecosystem, DSLRs are basically a Sony A5100. A mirrorless body without an EVF, but one that also gives the option of a traditional DSLR when that's beneficial.

There was a time when Canon was spat on for not having 1 4k body out, now there are several. Canikon may be slow to come around but when they do and the playing field starts to even up, then what? They still have the most/best lenses, and biggest customer momentum.

TBH it's my understanding that Japanese companies can be very traditional, so to speak. I think Canikon will simply make DSLRs and ML, side by side.

But it doesn’t matter if they innovate - people aren’t lining up to use D850’s for cinema, despite the credible 4K performance and wealth of lenses. The 5DIV has probably had the worst sales of any 5D model thus far, despite being substantially better than its predecessor, because people have little reason to upgrade.Mirrorless has three fundamental advantages:1) It’s way more hyped at the moment, its systems are imperfect and dynamic, and so it has captured the imaginations of wealthy hobbyists. These people want gimmicks, and they’ll get much more of that in mirrorless cameras.2) it’s much cheaper to build, meaning the margins are better. Also, it offers far more flexibility for lens designs thanks to their shallow flanges.3) Most big technological advances will come from computational photography at this point, and DSLRs are simply unsuitable for that. Holding a camera with arms stretched out SUCKS, especially a heavy brick with a fast lens - live view is just a poor replacement

That's an issue with DSLRs: they have to have both mirrorless and DSLR components, which makes them more costly to produce. That's why a D5 is $6500 while an A9 is $4500. Mirrorless cameras have shed all of the many DSLR parts that add to their cost. And it isn't just the cost of parts, but also the cost of assembling/installing/calibrating all of those components. For the same production volume, mirrorless should be a lot less expensive and more efficient to produce, resulting in higher margins. If you look at an A5100, it must be extremely inexpensive to produce compared to a DSLR because it's basically just a sensor, a lens mount, and a rear LCD. A Canon Rebel will have those parts, plus a lot more (DSLR) parts! That's why, in the long run, all manufacturers will switch over to mirrorless as their primary sellers. DSLRs will eventually become a niche product.

I do think that in the long term mirrorless will largely replace reflex mirrors even for sports use, but we're just not there yet for everything. The advantage of essentially zero lag (particularly with an electronic shutter) for action photography is obvious, but to be useful it's going to need something like a retina-resolution EVF with at least 120 Hz refresh, lag below 5ms, and battery life comparable to contemporary DSLR's.

There certainly are some things that could be done that DSLR's can't. For instance, the camera could continuously record at 15 fps into a 15 frame rolling buffer as long as the back button (which many action photographers use for AF) is pressed, and these frames are saved if any photos are taken. This would give the photographer an extra second of history, giving a fighting chance of capturing something that human reflexes alone can't. We'd obviously need huge, fast memory cards to make that most useful. Again, we're just not fully there yet.

the a9 has a 120hz oled evf, with zero blackout, no dslr can give you zero blackout, so it's already better for tracking action than any ovf can ever be.

the problem with dslr people is that they haven't experienced the a9, so they don't have any idea where mirrorless technology is actually at... what we see with the a9 is just the tip of the iceberg, within five years that level of performance will be the norm with new sony mirrorless cameras... the battery life is easily as good or better than dslrs.

olympus already has the streaming buffer, similar to how video cameras do it, i personally don't have a need for that, because i hit the shutter button in time, and i don't want to deal with the extra data storage... 15fps generates a lot of files, 20fps is even worse, but when it comes to getting the shot, that's the way to do it.

It's definitely a step in the right direction, but as I said, it's a matter of getting all the pieces together, and it doesn't sound like it's all there yet. I expect it will get there, but it won't get there overnight.

try an a9, and you'll see that it's already here... it's in a totally different league from other mirrorless cameras.

after using the a9, there is no way that i'll ever go back to any dslr... higher fps on a dslr just means more ovf blackout, and weaker af performance, because dslr autofocus can't function when the mirror is flapping around, it has to rely on prediction algorithms instead of actual af measurements.

One camera at $4,000 isn't changing the world. I can get a DSLR that can track action very well for $200. When even lower end ML offer the masses something like the A9, then we can talk about the formats changing. 1 camera does not a format make.

@Max Iso - "When even lower end ML offer the masses something like the A9, then we can talk."

Ok, let's talk then. Sony put a lot of the technology that's in the A9 into the much less expensive A7III. Here's what the A7III and A9 have in common:

A9's 693-point AF systemdesign and dimensions (the A7 III is 23g lighter)rear LCD monitor with touch focus capabilities100 to 51200 ISO, with extended “pull” 50 and “push” up to 204800 ISO (up to 102400 for video)5-axis stabilisation with 5.0Ev of compensation (CIPA standard)4K video with full pixel readout (1.2x crop at 30fps)NP-FZ100 battery for long battery lifedual SD card slot with one UHS-II compatible slotWifi, NFC and Bluetooth (for geotagging)

Just having the A9's amazing AF system in the A7III is a huge win for the A7III! But it also got the A9's excellent battery system (the A7III is supposedly even more efficient since it doesn't have the A9's stacked BSI image sensor) and more...for less than half the cost of the A9!

LOL $2k is lower end? ROFL i can get a D300 used for $200, which gives me Nikon's 51pt AF system. It's not the cutting edge measurebating specs of the new gear, but there's no ML options at that price that can offer the same. None. Heck i just got a FF with the same AF system for under $600.

These are cameras that pro sports shooters and wildlife shooters used to use, they are still capable today. Im using a 10yo FF camera and it nails focus every time i shoot. Every portrait on the eye. C-AF is spot on.

When a camera like the A7III is offered well below $1k, maybe that will be consumer territory. Not even close yet. There's a reason why Canon makes more off Rebels than it's high end. The masses are not spending $2k on any camera, nor am i.

"The E-mount is an open standard – anyone can create a lens for the E-mount system."

If an open standard is such a good thing, why has Sony not yet opened up the A-mount? It is still kept proprietary. Opening it up would increase the chances that third-parties release lenses for this mount.

@Barney Agreed. But in the big picture, these cameras are still in their infancy stage. They're still wearing leather football helmets ;)I foresee MANY third party options available in the very near future(next 5 years).

Given that numerous third parties HAD A-mount products and have dropped them - documentation availability isn't the issue.

A-mount protocols were, in general far simpler than E-mount. Non-SSM/SAM lenses electronic protocol was just a basic SPI EEPROM with not much data (there's a thread on ROM data analysis somewhere on dyxum).

Sony wants CaNikon to spend resources into mirrorless more broadly because they are confident they can win that battle. It is taunting your opponent to step into the line of fire.. I hope Canon and Nikon are careful in their pro-sumer or pro style mirrorless choices in the future.

I also wonder if Sony is interested in CaNikon both joining into the mirrorless sector more so it gives Sony more credence as a serious pro option. I mean if Canon and Nikon are offering pro-sumer or pro style mirrorless bodies, then it makes mirrorless as a whole more desirable in perception. It is shrewd...

It should be interesting in the digital camera world for the next few years.. at least.

I believe Canon and Nikon and just waiting to see the mirrorless market war stabilize and let the dust settle. Let shops like Sony make all the mistakes and when there is a clear path of where mirrorless is going, and some other tech (like battery life) resolved, Canon and Nikon will come out with their pro-Mirrorless systems.

I'm not a fan of the Sony cameras, but I do enjoy watching mirrorless tech being advanced as it is. I look forward to seeing what Canon and Nikon's take on pro-level mirrorless cameras.

@Gmon750 - What is this "war" that you think will stabilize? What is this "dust" that you think needs to settle? These are cliches. Cliches aside, Sony is rapidly building out a mirrorless system, rapidly advancing their mirrorless technologies, and converting serious enthusiast DSLR users year after year after year while Canon and Nikon sit watching. You seem to have some delusion that after Sony develops all of these things, they will share them all with Canon and Nikon to get them all caught up! "Here you go guys! Our gift to you!" LOL. No, Canon and Nikon will have to come in with their own technology, their own lenses, their own bodies, and go through their own growing pains. And it won't happen overnight. Sony has had the peddle to the metal on mirrorless for quite a while now. And they didn't have a big DSLR market to have to protect or hold them back. Plus, Canon/Nikon update cycles are waaaay slower than Sony's. How many years was it between the 7D/7DII or 6D/6DII?

And maybe they should consider updating their budget models.For a while there I was just waiting for Sony to update the A6000, but instead they kept releasing new models that are way more expensive.Eventually I bought the Fuji X-E2S (at $400 it's a bargain). I just wish Sigma would adopt the Fuji mount.

@JOrmsby"I'd hope a 16-50 2.8 would have a more professional build and image quality than the 24-105."

No way. The build of the Sony 24-105 F4 is excellent. Just compare it to the Fuji 16-55 F2.8: -The Sony has better IQ, more reach, OIS, weighs exactly the same, and has better close focus abilities. So, the combination 24-105 F4 +FF will always beat a 16-5X F2.8 on APS-C.

And just look at the size of the Fuji 16-55, if you want decent IQ the Sony version would be just as large. Such a lens would not balance well on the small A6X00 bodies.

Very interesting read, some of the questions were taken right out my head apparently! Thanks for the post!

"In really bad conditions, in really heavy rain, will photographers keep on taking pictures [for long periods of time?] I don’t think so." - this however struck me as weird, I heard from several Sony users that the A7 variants die next to a waterfall or on the coast with lots of moisture in the air. So that is something entirely different.

Interesting. But honestly I believe the professionals I have talked to over the years that have complained about this issue; not only with the A7R but also it's successors. Although I only once saw that camera shut down and have issues while I was standing next to someone who was using it while on a trip in Iceland next to Seljalandfoss.

I've read the same complaints about high-end Canon cameras for *years*. Nikon and Pentax do better, apparently, as they won't die at the first sight of a water droplet, but what you describe has been said of multiple camera makes.

Bad news for the fanboys that Sony accept they aren't up to Canon/Nikon pro standards. I couldn't help noticing that the editing comments don't accurately reflect what Mr. Tanaka says. Perhaps the editor knows more than what appears in here.

He was just giving a straight forward answer that they "need a balance between durability, and size and weight".Nothing wrong with this concept. Sony still needs to maximize their profit by lowering the build quality in order to sell more at a lower price.Up to now, you still have a better choice for professional use (like D5 and 1DX2), why waste the time to consider a second tier product for business?

For a few years now we've been recommending the Nikon D750 to enthusiasts and semi professionals needing the most reliable camera for the money. But it might finally be time to change that recommendation...

We've already posted lots of images from the Sony a7 III launch event, but now we've had plenty of time with the camera around our home base in Seattle. Check out our updated gallery to see the cherry blossoms at the University of Washington, historic coastal lighthouses and more.

On paper, the Sony a7 III is a tempting option for photographers who've been considering a switch to full-frame mirrorless. But how does its image quality stack up? We compare it to the Mark II and a few of its other peers.

Latest in-depth reviews

The Hasselblad X1D-50c is a mirrorless medium format camera from one of the most famous camera brands of the 20th century. Following a series of feature-enhancing firmware updates we've been able to complete our review.

The LG G7 ThinQ is a flagship device with a dual camera that departs from the norm: rather than the usual tele/wide combo, it offers wide and super-wide angle lenses. While it doesn't produce class-leading image quality, it's a solid option if you favor wide-angle shooting.

The Fujifilm X-T100 is the company's least expensive X-series camera to include an electronic viewfinder. It shares most of its guts with the entry-level X-A5, including its hybrid AF system and 24MP sensor and, unfortunately, its 4K/15p video mode.

Whether you're hitting the beach in the Northern Hemisphere or the ski slopes in the Southern, a rugged compact camera makes a great companion. In this buying guide we've taken a look at seven current models and chosen our favorites.

What's the best camera for a parent? The best cameras for shooting kids and family must have fast autofocus, good low-light image quality and great video. In this buying guide we've rounded-up several great cameras for parents, and recommended the best.

What's the best camera for shooting landscapes? High resolution, weather-sealed bodies and wide dynamic range are all important. In this buying guide we've rounded-up several great cameras for shooting landscapes, and recommended the best.

What’s the best camera costing over $2000? The best high-end camera costing more than $2000 should have plenty of resolution, exceptional build quality, good 4K video capture and top-notch autofocus for advanced and professional users. In this buying guide we’ve rounded up all the current interchangeable lens cameras costing over $2000 and recommended the best.

Alex and Kathryn are photographers, friends and Tokyo residents who love exploring Japan's hidden cultural treasures. They each brought a Canon EOS M50 on a recent trip starting in bustling Tokyo and ending in the peaceful riverside town of Gujo Hachiman.

Canon's latest 70-200mm F4L comes with a five stops of image stabilization, a new coat of paint and impressive sharpness. We've been shooting with our copy for several weeks now - see how it stacks up in our sample gallery.

Special 4K and 6K Photo modes may be one of the most under-appreciated features on recent cameras. In this week's episode, Chris and Jordan take a closer look at these modes and explain why – and when – you'll be glad to have them on your camera.

Ten years ago this month Panasonic and Olympus announced a new concept called Micro Four Thirds. We're now on the brink of full-frame mirrorless from at least one major player, so perhaps it's a good time to take a look back at where it all started – and how far we've come.

At a high-profile launch event in New York, Samsung took the wraps off its next Note device. The Galaxy Note 9 borrows the S9+'s 12MP dual-aperture dual-cam, with OIS in both cameras and an emphasis on AI-enhanced shooting modes.

One of the most keenly-awaited lenses for a while, the new Pentax D FA* 50mm F1.4 is finally here, and we've been using it for a few days. In this article, we're updating our initial impressions on the basis of our recent shooting with the K-1 II.

This week we take a look at one of the most unusual optics we've seen for quite a while. The Laowa 24mm F14 Macro Probe lens may look like something out of a science fiction movie, but as Chris and Jordan discover, it opens the door to some pretty cool photo opportunities.

GoPro has revealed its Q2 2018 financial results, boasting a massive 40% quarter-over-quarter revenue increase to $283 million and net loss of $32 million, which the company says is a 51% sequential improvement.